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Although I haven't actually read The Discontinuity Guide (Mr. Cornell, please forgive me), I've been acquainted with this theory for quite some time. It certainly makes watching the Five Doctors easier. My question is whether or not this theory has become accepted canon by the BBC and Doctor Who community?

[Quote by: LanaiaD] As someone new again to Who what is Season 6B. I've heard it mentioned but not without conflict so I'm curious.

I just found a wikipedia page on the subject here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Season_6B

I'll go ahead and post the first paragraph:

[Quote Season 6B or Season 6 is a popular fan theory related to the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. An example of fanon, it is a hypothetical series of adventures of the Doctor that takes place between the last serial of Season 6, The War Games (first broadcast in 1969), and the first serial of Season 7, Spearhead from Space (first broadcast in 1970). This unconfirmed piece of continuity was first used by fans, notably Paul Cornell, to explain away certain continuity problems in the programme, and subsequently as a scenario in a number of novels and other productions.

I'm afraid I'll have to take issue with it "first being used by fans". It was the organizing principle for the Second Doctor's era in TV Comic. Fans may have later given it a proper name, "Season 6B" and all, but the basic idea of there being a gap between "Games" and "Spearhead" was a contemporary one.

Of course, back then, the whole business of the CIA wasn't involved; it was simply that there was a gap between when we last saw Troughton and when we first saw Pertwee.

The addition of the Celestial Intervention Agency and the power struggle between two camps in Gallifreyan society was added very much later. For this "fuller" explanation of the gap, you'd be hard pressed to find a better source than the novel World Game by Terrance Dicks. Written during the first season of RTD Who, it not only "codifies" the fan theory into an explicit story, but also throws a coupla bones in the direction of Christopher Eccleston. The whole thing feels like Dicks solving one last mystery about the past before the current series comes in and takes the story in fresh directions. Poetic, really, that Dicks ends with the old series exactly where he began: writing about the Second Doctor's final days.

"I think of myself as ambitious in casting terms, and I know that Bonnie [Langford] has the potential to make the part totally unirritating . . ." — JNT, 1986

[Quote by: DarthSkeptical] I'm afraid I'll have to take issue with it "first being used by fans". It was the organizing principle for the Second Doctor's era in TV Comic. Fans may have later given it a proper name, "Season 6B" and all, but the basic idea of there being a gap between "Games" and "Spearhead" was a contemporary one.

Of course, back then, the whole business of the CIA wasn't involved; it was simply that there was a gap between when we last saw Troughton and when we first saw Pertwee.

The addition of the Celestial Intervention Agency and the power struggle between two camps in Gallifreyan society was added very much later. For this "fuller" explanation of the gap, you'd be hard pressed to find a better source than the novel World Game by Terrance Dicks. Written during the first season of RTD Who, it not only "codifies" the fan theory into an explicit story, but also throws a coupla bones in the direction of Christopher Eccleston. The whole thing feels like Dicks solving one last mystery about the past before the current series comes in and takes the story in fresh directions. Poetic, really, that Dicks ends with the old series exactly where he began: writing about the Second Doctor's final days.

World Game sounds like an amazingly good read. So did you find it as entertaining as it is historically important? Thank you for calling my attention to the novel. Darth, you are a veritable Doctor Who encyclopedia of knowledge.

And before I forget, thank you for your past reviews of the Paul McGann radio plays. I can't wait to find out how Human Resources works out.

[Quote by: Fairport]World Game sounds like an amazingly good read. So did you find it as entertaining as it is historically important? Thank you for calling my attention to the novel. Darth, you are a veritable Doctor Who encyclopedia of knowledge.

Well, I think it's probably fair to say that World Game splits fan opinion. Few reviews I've read suggest that it's dreck or anything so dire. But I've seen it damned with the faint praise of "a typical Terrance Dicks effort" often enough to know that my views may be a little out of step with the majority.

Personally, I love it so much that it's a central part of my own personal canon. I think this is because it's fairly atypical Dicks, really. I found the character development unusually strong for a Dicks novel. The characterization of Lady Serena, the Doctor's main "companion" in the piece, was so well-rounded for a female character I really wondered whether Dicks had written it. I found the Serena/Second Doctor interaction deliberately evocative of, but distinct from, the Romana I/Fourth Doctor relationship. Their separation at the end of the book (and that's not giving anything away; the point of the novel is to explain how Jamie and the Doctor come back into partnership for "The Two Doctors") made me genuinely sad. Indeed, one of the neat tricks of the book was that, although it ostensibly sets out to confirm the Doctor's tense relationship with Gallifrey, it also shows you how he can care for individual members of his own race. Thus, it helps you understand how this guy whose spent his whole life running away from Gallifrey can be moved to tears in the current series by its destruction.

Another strength of the novel is its construction, which is unusually langorous for a Dicks work. Normally, he's a kinda "all guns blazing" author, rushing over details left and right. But here, he's got a good hook at the beginning, a slow burn in the middle, and a helluva ending.

The historical aspect is also highly unusual for DIcks, who came to the programme only after it had decided to give up on historicals. Sure, it's a pseudo historical. But it's more historical than pseudo, perhaps. I don't know about the accuracy of the details; Revolutionary France isn't exactly my strong suit.

Oh! And that's the other thing. It goes to prove what was established in the original Series 1 and confirmed in new Series 2: The Doctor loves 18th century France! I love that bit of irony about this most iconoclastic of British heroes.

Now, I should say that the book apparently is a part of a wider narrative about the beings who are pulling the strings on the titular "World Game", but I don't know too much about that bigger story arc. Apparently it involves several different Doctors and as a whole certainly has its detractors.

But on its own merits, I think most people who really like the 1960s Doctor Who will readily appreciate what is for now the final chapter of the Second Doctor's run. As a swansong for a bygone era on Doctor Who, I"m not sure there was a better novel written in that last year of the Past Doctors series. Nor could the ex-Head Writer have given the current Head Writer a better aloha.

[Quote by=Fairport]And before I forget, thank you for your past reviews of the Paul McGann radio plays. I can't wait to find out how Human Resources works out.

Thanks, man! I'm really glad you enjoyed them. But more importantly, I hope they helped you get into the excellent work of everyone concerned with the Radio 7 series.

"I think of myself as ambitious in casting terms, and I know that Bonnie [Langford] has the potential to make the part totally unirritating . . ." — JNT, 1986